A canceled Lithuanian martial arts champion takes refuge in a family-run restaurant in Taiwan as he tries to rebuild his life within the China Sea. A poignant drama concerning the gravity of sin and second probabilities, created by director Jurgis Matulevicius (Isaac, 2019) and screenwriter Saule Bryuvaite, whose characteristic directorial debut, Poisonous, gained the highest prize at Locarno 2024.
The movie, impressed by the true story of a Lithuanian fighter, made its world premiere on the twenty ninth Tallinn Black Nights Movie Pageant (PÖFF) in Estonia and simply gained the Critics Selection Competitors.
The synopsis for the movie reads, “Champion fighter Osvald (Marius Lepsis) is banned from competing after injuring a younger woman in a road combat.” “Struck in his desolate hometown in Lithuania, he takes refuge in a dilapidated Taiwanese restaurant run by his solely pal, Jurong. By means of court-ordered remedy, he meets Skyste, a lady who gives him a glimpse of a life he by no means knew existed. However as Osvald clings to this fleeting hope, his violent previous comes again to hang-out him, forcing him to decide on between salvation and self-destruction.”
The solid additionally contains Jag Huang, Severiya Janusauskite, Sonia Yuan, and Vaidotas Martinaitis. Ieva Czern and Stasis Bartakis produced the movie, with Amy Ma, Marta Gmosinska, Mariusz Włodarski, Jakub Koszjar and Vratislav Szlájer serving as co-producers.
Watch the trailer for China Sea right here.
THR spoke to the movie’s director and screenwriter about China Sea as the primary Lithuanian-Taiwanese co-production, mixing true story with fiction and exploring the darkish facet of humanity in a proud and gritty fashion.
“The story is impressed by an actual particular person from Lithuania who was a famous person in Asia, particularly Japan, within the early 2000s. He was a world famous person and was very well-known overseas,” Matulevicius explains. “So some producers got here to me and requested me if I wished to make a biopic on this man, they usually mentioned this film can be a film celebrating him. I Googled him, and sure, he was a famous person, however he was additionally a really controversial particular person, so I would not have a good time him in a biopic. That is not my fashion.”
So, “Jurgis rejected the concept, however this man was from my hometown, so the story stayed in our heads,” Bryubayt recollects. “And I used to be studying rather a lot concerning the tales that had been going to return out. He was a famous person outdoors of his house nation, however at house he was recognized for having very violent incidents and being related to unhealthy crowds.”
In 2015, he was shot to dying with an computerized rifle. There was one other man the filmmaking duo was interested by. There was a small Asian restaurant known as China Sea in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. “You will see this middle-aged Asian man simply standing there.” [outside the restaurant] “Everyone seems to be remoted they usually smoke on a regular basis,” she defined, “so for me it turned very fascinating to discover this story of immigration in Lithuania,” Matulevicius added.
A typical theme between the 2 males struck him. “These are two utterly totally different folks, however they each dwell their lives in a form of isolation. This kickboxing famous person feels lonely as a result of nobody thinks of him as a star again house. And this household is making an attempt to run an Asian restaurant in Lithuania, which can be a lonely expertise. So we felt there was a connection there.”
“China Sea”
China Sea opens with actual tv footage of the match from Eurosport with a German commentator, mixed with footage shot with the movie’s lead actors. The author has to confess he did not get it, however the director replies, “It has been edited so you do not know. This primary scene is supposed to point out his famous person nature.”
However frustration, anger, and poisonous masculinity all affect his problem to discover a path in life that he’s proud of. “Our protagonist has a male physique, however his mindset continues to be caught in his teenagers,” explains Matulevicius. “The world is altering, however you are still caught in your teenage years. You in all probability lived in a poor neighborhood. Your function fashions had been males filled with poisonous masculinity. And also you tried to be part of their world. When you do not, you are a sissy.” They turn out to be ugly folks, they usually do not present their feelings. So that you solely know anger and violence, and you’ll’t specific your self, since you’ve been taught that males do not cry, that males are robust, that they do not have feelings. I believe that is the tragedy of our protagonist. ”
However he desires change. “He begins considering, ‘Perhaps I am doing one thing incorrect. I want to vary. I have to be a greater particular person,'” the director says. “And that is what he is making an attempt to do. He is beginning to practice the youngsters, befriending the immigrants, making an attempt to assist them on the restaurant.”
“He is on the trail to therapeutic, and also you’re watching him undergo monks and psychotherapy, and on the identical time you are watching the crime occur.” It wasn’t till he noticed the completed model of the movie that the author absolutely realized one thing. “This can be a film about folks making an attempt to heal personally whereas being blind to what is going on on round them,” she tells THR.
The title, “China Sea,” refers back to the enormous hurdles that should be overcome to achieve the vacation spot, the opposite facet, and is “an easy metaphor that was within the script early on on this mission,” the author added.
“China Sea”
The China Sea duo additionally shares some insights that you just won’t understand as a viewer. For instance, the person who performed the principle character’s coach was the real-life coach of the real-life martial artist who served because the inspiration for the film.
“After we launched this ocean metaphor to Coach, I very clearly bear in mind him getting emotional as he felt a connection to somebody he knew and the concept of striving to be higher, however this [ocean] It’s getting greater and greater,” says Briuvait.
Matulevicius additionally took cinematic inspiration from the China Sea from Gethin Aldous and Gyrus McCreary’s 2017 documentary The Work, which additionally offers with rehabilitation in a extra direct method. “Set in a room at Folsom Jail, three males from the surface world take part in a four-day group remedy camp with a bunch of incarcerated males to actually look at the challenges of reintegration into society,” the synopsis reads.
China Sea’s lead character, Lepsis, did martial arts for 10 years when he was youthful, so he knew easy methods to transfer and “had the look,” Matulevicius informed THR concerning the casting selection. “However after all, for him, it was a very powerful preparation, as a result of once I invited him to do the function, he weighed 110 kilograms and I informed him he wanted to be 84 years previous. And he mentioned, ‘Okay, I am going to do it.’ And he was actually devoted. ”
Nevertheless, casting a Taiwanese particular person appeared a bit unrealistic to the director. “Once I went to Taiwan, they launched me to some folks. And I noticed these stars. And I questioned, can we get them? Do they actually need to do that film? The actor who performs the restaurant proprietor [Jag Huang (Life of Pi)] He was in an Ang Lee film. and sonia [Yuan] He appeared on “Drive My Automobile.” However they mentioned they had been actually interested by touring to the Baltics. ”
“China Sea”
Maybe probably the most tough scene to movie within the China Sea from a technical standpoint is what the inventive workforce merely calls the “ice scene.” “For that shot, we would have liked a gap within the ice in the course of this lake,” the director recollects. “Our well being and security supervisor mentioned we could not do this. But when we put strings on the actors, we might do it. So we did that. And for 2 months, we stored eradicating the strings in post-production. It was a really painstaking job.”
China Sea’s inventive duo has no extra main collaborative tasks deliberate and is as a substitute engaged on new concepts of their very own. However Briuvaite emphasizes that she and Matulevicius wish to share concepts and drafts of scripts. “We perceive one another very nicely, which helps us rather a lot,” she says. “And we every give our sincere and brutal opinion. Not everybody can do this.”
Matulevicius talks concerning the subsequent movie he desires to make: He hopes the movie will shift the main focus from the moist ocean world to dry sand. “I might love to return to the Curonian Spit from the mid-Nineteenth century to the mid-Twentieth century,” he says. This UNESCO World Heritage Website is a skinny, curved sand dune that separates the Curonian Lagoon from the Baltic Sea, shared by Lithuania and Russia. The lagoon used to have a number of sand carried by the wind. The director explains: “Individuals’s properties had been always being submerged, so we needed to relocate them on a regular basis.”
